nearly three weeks ago in northern nigeria, high school girls, possibly more than 200 of them, were kidnapped from their school in a remote village. debora patta is in south africa. she's been following the story for us. debora. >> reporter: many local officials are too scared to go to this village because of attacks by islamist extremists and this makes it difficult to get reliable information. this is partly why we've seen such a discrepancy in the numbers of how many girls have been taken. >> ♪ all we are saying is give... ♪ >> reporter: it's been 19 days since the school girls were kidnapped. in desperation, parents and friends have taken to the streets to protest, accusing the nigerian government of doing nothing to rescue their daughters. >> we want to see our daughters come back alive and we want to see them now. >> yes! >> reporter: the teen-aged girls were snatched at night by heavily armed gunmen. they were taken from their boarding school in chibok, which was burned to the ground. this school girl was one of a small group who managed to flee from her captors. "we thought they w